Amiga 500 case broken

[ADuck]

Hey people thanks for checking in,

I need a bit of help. While removing the cover of my Amiga 500 for the first time in decades it broke, here are some photos of it.

Is there any good way to repair it, like superglue? Or should I start looking for a replacement case for it?

I would be most grateful for any help I can get.

[abundantmussel]

I have a similar break on the left side of mine by the caps lock key. I was thinking superglue also.

[gurth]

how. on. earth.

I'd buy a replacement.

[ADuck]

Originally Posted by gurth

how. on. earth.

I'd buy a replacement.

Well, the case already had the 2 fractures near the cursor key. I was taking care while removing the case but, like I've said, I haven't touched this Amiga in 20 years and the case was stuck with dust and grime. I applied a little force, nothing out of the ordinary, and it cracked.

Good news is the Amiga is working and I'm planning on getting an ACA500plus and a Gotek for it. Still, I wasn't expecting the case to crack like this.

[ElectroBlaster]

Cracked an A500 case some years back! I happend to have some decent Araldite Superglue. I rolled with it and the repair was better than I thought it would be! It has held fast and did not make any mess. The problem with superglue is, if you go for cheap-nasty stuff in a little metal tube, it is hard to control the flow of it and then for some annoying reason it seems to bloom and all this white crap spreads all over the place! good quality superglue in a plastic bottle or one with a brush works great

[pandy71]

Originally Posted by ADuck

Hey people thanks for checking in,

I need a bit of help. While removing the cover of my Amiga 500 for the first time in decades it broke, here are some photos of it.

Is there any good way to repair it, like superglue? Or should I start looking for a replacement case for it?

I would be most grateful for any help I can get.

Superglue is evil thing - avoid it at all cost. Search for plastic welding in your area, ask car service guys - they should know someone who can fix it - good plastic welding can make this almost invisible.
In my country there is plenty of such services, not sure how this look in Portugal but i can assume you should be able to find someone.

If you insist to glue then go for epoxy resin - two compound solution, additionally to reinforce place use glass fabric (same as used for making composite - roving fabric - you can use thin glass fiber wallpaper) - place glass fabric at bottom, use sufficient amount of epoxy resin, another method is reinforce place by using steel wires sufficiently hot to be placed within material (at bottom) - problem with glue is very small surface of broken parts and using glue, especially super glue without any reinforcement will be quickly broken again.

[TjLaZer]

There's a guy in the UK that sells Amiga parts and he has plenty of cases for a reasonable price. He sells on eBay

[ADuck]

Hey all,

I ended up using an epoxy resin, two compound solution. I was unable to find any plastic welder so I had to choose the next safest solution available here, which was epoxy resin.

This is the result, it isn't perfect but it'll have to do.

https://imgur.com/a/mRxyC

Thanks all for the help.

[pandy71]

You can try to use some car putty (polyester two compound) - usually they are available in few colours - try to find colours similar to plastic and apply to cover gap, a bit of fine sandpaper will do the rest. And i strongly recommend to reinforce area as i described before - this area will be under mechanical stress and contact area can be to small.

[ElectroBlaster]

Very interested to see everyone's solutions on this subject! I need to repair an A1500 front panel. All of the mounting posts were ripped off by the previous owner and they used some kind of two-part epoxy resin. I would have left it alone but they never positioned the posts back on properly, most of them were off centre which meant the panel just would not like up right back on the top case

I spent a while cleaning it all out. I was going to use superglue re-attach the posts first, then put in the permanent solution over it all to reinforce the lot maybe...

[pandy71]

Cyanoacrylate glue has a low shearing strength, which has led to its use as a temporary adhesive in cases where the piece needs to be sheared off later.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyanoacrylate

[jlin_au]

The casing is supposed to be made from ABS plastic.

See if you can get some Tamiya ABS cement:
https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&r...HxwYfcdPknUnsW

The ABS cement should dissolve the ABS at the joins and weld the pieces together. Remember to carefully clamp the pieces together while the cement is "curing".

Remember to only clean up the bulging cement/plastic on the joins after the joins have fully cured and are hard again. You can then clean up the top visible surfaces with a sharp hobby knife, very fine jewelers files and 1000 grit progressively higher grit sanding sheets.

You may want to look at reinforcing the joins by super-gluing long flat pieces of brass sheet or T frames underneath.

[mpattonm]

Originally Posted by jlin_au

The casing is supposed to be made from ABS plastic.

See if you can get some Tamiya ABS cement:
https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&r...HxwYfcdPknUnsW

The ABS cement should dissolve the ABS at the joins and weld the pieces together. Remember to carefully clamp the pieces together while the cement is "curing".

Remember to only clean up the bulging cement/plastic on the joins after the joins have fully cured and are hard again. You can then clean up the top visible surfaces with a sharp hobby knife, very fine jewelers files and 1000 grit progressively higher grit sanding sheets.

You may want to look at reinforcing the joins by super-gluing long flat pieces of brass sheet or T frames underneath.

Acetone will do equally same.

[Nosferax]

Ductape, man, ductape is always the answer